The Great Catsby
by Talent Hounds
Summary: Think The Great Gatsby, except with dogs and cats!
1. Chapter 1: The Move to West Egg

CHAPTER 1: The Move to West Egg

I never thought that so much could happen in just one summer. I know this is a dog eat dog world, but how could things have gotten so out of control? I don't think I'll ever really know how, but I need to write it all down, to tell the story, so that maybe someday someone will be able to figure out why we acted the way we did.

Hi, I'm Nick Carraway. It is the year 1922, and this is my diary.

This was a time where the treats were thicker, the parties were bigger, and the morals—there were none. I attended Tail University for puppies and now I sell bones. After the war, I moved from the Midwest to go out East, on Long Island where West Egg became my new home. That is where this whole story begins.

I moved into my small doghouse, which was barely big enough to fit me but somehow took up most of my paycheck. After eating my first meal of cheap kibble, and slurping up the water in my bowl, I looked at myself in the mirror. I had what I now know to have been a giddy, far too naïve smile. It wasn't my fault; I couldn't have known what would happen in the next couple of months.

Well, pretty soon after I moved in, my cousin and her mate, Daisy and Tom Buchanan, who lived across the lake from me, had a dinner. This is where I met the gorgeous golfer Jordan Baker, the most beautiful and most intimidating dog I had ever met. This is Daisy, my very pretty second cousin. She is married to Tom Buchanan, who I was at school with. Tom was old money, entitled, pure-bred sort. The kind that didn't understand the value of a chew toy, or a treat, and is only happy when he's got millions of treats and toys. Once he's got everything any dog could possibly want. He marked his territory everywhere.

I soon learned that, in this time, faithful was not a term used in elite conversation. Daisy's husband, Tom, was having a torrid affair with Myrtle Wilson, and Daisy's own history of love was the catalyst for this tale. Myrtle was unhappily married to George Wilson, who owns an unsuccessful garage for broken chew toys.

Next door to me is the mysterious Jay Catsby, whose huge mansion is the setting of his many lavish parties. He's always had so many treat, bones, and chew toys. I was how he ever got so much fun stuff to play with…

Not long after I moved to the East, I was invited to one of my mysterious neighbour's parties. And I like large parties. They're so intimate. At small parties there isn't any privacy. What was so strange, however, was that hardly anyone had received an invite, or even knew who the host was, not that Catsby had ever really made himself all that known. But I did not really care, because Jordan was there! We chased each other around the dance floor all night long! She's a bit standoffish, but she sure smells good.

Now I've been seeing a bit of Catsby—I actually enjoy his company very much. But some of his associates are a bit suspect. I've been trying to understand who exactly this Catsby is, he's a bit of an enigma, and I struggle to learn anything genuine about him. His true identity is what occupies my mind most of the—SQUIRREL!

I guess this dog-eat-dog world is much smaller than I thought, because it turns out that Catsby and I served in the same division in the war, but that is not what Catsby finds so interesting about me. Rather, it is that my cousin is Daisy.

After spending more time with Jordan, she revealed to me the answer to the question that is Catsby. Despite Catsby's own description of his tragic and bejeweled past, he comes from a penniless Midwestern family. Ever since before the war, Catsby has been in love with Daisy and has always wanted to be with her. Unfortunately, the war and school pulled the two apart. They went their separate ways, but now Catsby has returned and hoped to marry her once again.

It all makes sense now! The reason he bought a house here, the reason why he throws such extravagant parties is so that Daisy, his only true love, will come back to him.


	2. Chapter 2: Tea with Catsby and Daisy

CHAPTER 2: Tea with Catsby and Daisy

Jordan and I have decided to reunite my friend, Catsby, with Daisy, so we invited the two of them to tea. I have to say the tea was awkward at first, but soon enough, Daisy and Catsby fell in love once again.

I remember that day so clearly. Daisy sat, pretty as ever, with Catsby in the doorway.

Smiling at him, she said, "I'm certainly glad to see you again."

He stared at her, and I wondered if cats even knew how to smile, and, if they did, if Daisy and us other dogs would be able to recognize it.

"I'm certainly glad to see you again, too," Catsby said, purring slightly.

Daisy and Catsby fell in love once again, but as with many marriages these days, their love was in the form of an affair. Soon after they began seeing each other again, Daisy invited Catsby, Jordan, and me to lunch at her house. The only problem was that Daisy's husband, Tom, was there!

Tom, as he should be, was suspicious that Daisy and Catsby were seeing each other again. As we all drove into Manhattan, Tom drove Catsby's yellow car with Jordan and me, while Catsby and Daisy drove Tom's car. When we stopped to get gas, Tom saw his mistress, Myrtle, who was leaving town with her husband after he had learned that she was being unfaithful to him. What Myrtle's husband did not know, however, was with whom Myrtle was having the affair.

On that drive, I learned that Tom knew about Catsby's love for Daisy, and he could not restrain himself for much longer. Tom was not, after all, a forgiving dog.

"Now see here," Tom growled. "I know I'm not very popular. I don't give big parties. I suppose you've got to make you house into a pigsty in order o have any friends in the modern world, but I need to protect my possessions!"

"I've got something to tell you, old sport—" Catsby started, but Daisy interrupted him.

"Please don't! Please let's all go home." Daisy begged.

Catsby stared at Daisy, and then turned to Tom, hissing, "You're wife doesn't love you, she's never loved you. She loves me. She only married you because I was poor and she was tired of waiting for me. And what's more, I love Daisy too."

Tom stopped growling, and turned to face Daisy. "Daisy, tell me the truth. Do you love this cat?"

Daisy paused, whimpered a little, and then nodded. "It's true, but I did love you once, Tom. Only, I loved Catsby too. Please let's get out!"

Tom was angrier than I had ever seen him, but he still maintained that calm, elitist visage. "You two start on home, Daisy, in Mr. Catsby's yellow car."

Daisy and Catsby drove off in a flurry of rage and sadness and passion, Daisy at the wheel, but they did not see who was crossing the road in front of them…

Myrtle raced into the street, thinking that it was Tom who was still driving the yellow car and that he would stop to say goodbye to her before she left. But Daisy could not stop in time and killed her.

"Oh my God! What are we going to do?" Daisy screamed.


	3. Chapter 3: The Crash

CHAPTER 3: The Crash

Once Tom and the rest of us discovered Myrtle's body, Tom and Daisy decided to leave town together. Tom, still furious with Catsby and Daisy, told Myrtle's husband that it was Catsby, not Tom, with whom Myrtle was having the affair. When I confronted Catsby about it, he told me everything.

"I love her," Catsby said. "I have always loved her. And so when Daisy struck Myrtle with the car I was prepared to take the blame. And I know what you will tell me, old sport, but I cannot leave. I will not flee."

So I let Catsby be. I shouldn't have. I found Catsby's body in the pool, a few meters away from where Myrtle's husband's body lay, a half-eaten block of chocolate in his paw.

Catsby had built up the idea of Daisy so much in his mind that she could never live up to how he had imagined her. And so, just as we all did in that time, she crashed and he crashed.

I arranged my friend's funeral, attended only by me, Catsby's father, a single former party guest who I did not even know, and servants. A disgustingly small turnout at the funeral.

All I kept thinking about, over and over, was: "You can't live forever; you can't live forever."

He may have had nine lives, but he was not immortal. He was not immune to the dangers of falling in love.

I decided to end all my relationships in New York with the people I had formerly called my friends, and returned to the Midwest. Perhaps that is what we all should have done…

THE END.


End file.
